Another year passes, and another wagon rolls off into the history books.
With SUVs choking every highway and byway in the U.S., the station wagon has definitely fallen by the wayside in recent decades. Here’s the thing, though: The few that are left can actually be a really cool if you want to be a bit different from the neighbors. The Volvo V60 is a good example of understated luxury and practicality, and the Polestar Engineered model just happens to do that with 455 horsepower and 523 lb-ft of torque on tap. It’s a total sleeper — or rather, it was, as Volvo confirmed on its customer-facing website that it’s no longer available in America.
So now, we don’t get a plug-in hybrid V60 at all in the U.S., and as an enthusiast that sucks. Granted, there are a couple takeaways from this latest development. The V60 Cross Country and the V90 (non-Cross Country) will stick around, at least for the time being. Looking at the situation from a business perspective, it is easy to see why Volvo killed this particular model off: Wagons just don’t sell. Turns out, the relatively few people who lean toward something a bit different pales in comparison to, say, your typical XC60 or XC90 shoppers. I know, that’s a huge shocker (not).
In fact, Volvo dealers moved just 3,391 wagons last year. That’s less than 3% of the company’s total volume over here, while SUVs represented 85.8% of total sales. The XC60, for its part, outsold the V60 by more than ten-to-one.
It’s a point we’ve made time and time again over the years: Buying a wagon these days is definitely a niche decision that makes little business sense in the current climate. Nevertheless, like with the state of manual transmission cars, I’m sad to see the V60 Polestar Engineered roll off into the sunset. As a practical car that happens to be a total sleeper, it’s a match made in heaven for the relatively few people who go out of their way to buy one.
